


Know Me Better

by diamondgore



Category: Generation X (Comic), New X-Men: Academy X, X-Men (Comicverse), X-Men (Movieverse)
Genre: F/F, Femslash February, First Kisses, First Loves, Gift Exchange, this is all about teenagers being awkward, this is very cliche
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-27
Updated: 2020-02-27
Packaged: 2021-02-28 03:26:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,033
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22957141
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/diamondgore/pseuds/diamondgore
Summary: It's the teenage aspect of being in love.
Relationships: Cessily Kincaid/Roxanne Washington
Comments: 3
Kudos: 8
Collections: Valentine's Day XChange





	Know Me Better

**Author's Note:**

> Hi BeaR, I hope you're having a wonderful day, and you enjoy my gift to you this February!!
> 
> I unfortunately haven't read enough about ricstar to write something that I would consider quality, but I hope this Mercury and Bling! piece brings you joy!

It had been an open school day at the Jean Grey School today, and while many of their past student run open days had ended in ruin, today they seemed to end up just fine. They had a controlled environment this time because most of the students that were deemed to be a threat to an event were taken out of school grounds for a day. This left the head administrators of the school with a handful of students to give tours around the school and to introduce people or give them an inside look on mutant life. It was sort of a spectacle, but it was good publicity.

To add to that spectacle, administration usually picked visible mutants to help give the tours, and Roxy and Cessily were perfect for it. They had both been chosen due to their charismatic nature. Cessily had gotten it, her charisma, from years of being a popular girl at school, while Roxy had gotten hers from her parents as it was incredibly hard to get anywhere in the music industry if you couldn’t hold a conversation with anyone. For both of them, it wasn’t a natural talent, but a honed skill.

They realized soon enough that their years of training came in handy because of their physical mutations, it was incredibly hard to have a conversation with someone when they were scared of you. They would never outright admit that it helped them become more charismatic, but both of them knew that it did. This innate charisma also made them some very entertaining tour guides, especially for the younger brattier tween crowed who usually refused to listen to anyone. Once Kitty Pryde saw that they had charmed the kids, she booked the two of them for all the tours for the rest of the day.

When they had returned to their forms from their first few tours together, Roxy and Cessily were complaining about all the children that they had to show around the school, and how much they had to repeat that stupid script that administration had given them. They chatted about all the snot covered children that they had to give tours to, and laughed recalling how they had some of the kids starting fights over which of them had a cooler mutation, while their parents looked at them in abject horror, as Cessily and Roxy didn’t break apart the fight. It was too much of an everyday occurance for them, this type of petty violence. Both of them thought it couldn’t be avoided. Much of the propaganda that was used against mutants showed them as either child soldiers or as menaces against society, it was probably where the kids internalized that this was type of behavior that was expected from mutants. 

Roxy stopped laughing for a moment, and sucked in a deep breath. “Do you think we’re lying, Cess? Telling them that the school is a safe place when we get attacked on an almost monthly, sometimes weekly, basis?”

Cessily plopped down on the bed across from where Roxy was sitting. She thought about it for a moment. She chewed on her lip, waiting for an answer to come to mind, but even though they were under attack, at least it was legal for them to fight back. In most places the police would take the side of a flatscan and not a mutant. 

“We’re safer here, I think.” Cessily tilted her head to the side, causing strands of ginger hair to cover her shoulder. “We’re an easier target but it’s a lot easier to live knowing that there’s someone always out there looking out for us.”

Roxy crinkles her nose, as if in disagreement, but she keeps quiet, waiting for Cessily to finish her point. 

“Like, imagine going to a school with humans, do you know how hard it would be to make friends or just function in class? What if your teacher hates you? Then, what? You can go to Shadowcat or Storm here and complain, but in real life, they’re not gonna believe a mutant. We just have different challenges inside here, you know?”

“I know.” Roxy responded, with a soft voice. “I just don’t know whether lying to them is the correct thing to do in this situation, especially since both you and I know this isn’t the best place to grow up.” 

Cessily can agree with her on that. There were so many situations they could have never been exposed to growing up, had changed their adolescence dramatically. They aged at a rapid pace, faster than most children. But they could only dream of what would have happened if they never came to the Jean Grey School, if that was ever a choice for girls like them. Growing up around mutants had given them a chance to grow up around people of their own, and understand the politics of their existence a little better. Perhaps, growing up here, rather than trying to exist in the outside world was better for them. 

Cessily lips are pulled into a slightly confident smile, “I don’t think we’re lying when we tell them that it’s safe here. We’re certainly not downplaying the fact that we’ve had some catastrophes and tragedies, but...ultimately, it’s safer here, don’t you think?” 

“Mhm,” Roxy sighed. She can tell that Cessily isn’t completely satisfied with her argument, but there isn’t a perfect and neat answer for something like this. “Sorry I bought it up, I just don’t know if we’re being as transparent as we say we are.” 

“I don’t think anyone is as transparent as they think they are.” Cessily reassured Roxy. It was the only thing she could do to ease her mind. “At least the kids we gave tours to today seemed to be super excited about campus.”

Roxy tried not to dwell too long on her thoughts of insincerity. Worrying about the minor things and the things she couldn’t control was what always got her. She got off the chair, and strode over to Cessily, sitting down next to her. “You’re great at pulling me out of a negative loop Cess, I don’t know what I’d do without you.” 

“Hey don’t just thank me,” Cessily draped herself over Roxy’s shoulders, she knew she was heavy but Roxy could handle her weight, “You’ve been doing a lot of this work yourself, Roxy.” 

“You can’t deny that we make a good team though. You help me out, and I help you out. Maybe together we can help other people out, like the stuff we did today.” 

Cessily smiled back at Roxy and shifted so that her legs were in the lap of Roxy, before pulling herself up, wrapping an arm around Roxy. “We should do more stuff for the school like this. It’s nice seeing other people more comfortable in their own skin because of us.” 

Seeing kids with physical mutation gaze at her and finding a sense of comfort or a sense of family, was always great. It stirred up feelings of geniality inside of her that she had thought she’d forgotten. Being made out of mercury, made her sense of warmth haywire in the beginning, she was always trying to find it again, until she realized it was emotional warmth that she was missing from her life. Roxy seemed to regulate that, now that Cessily had allowed her into her heart. 

Roxy pressed her face to the neck Cessily’s, nuzzling her skin, it was as if she knew that Cessily needed to be warm again. Cessily giggled, and felt a faux sensation of blush covering her entire skin. She felt Roxy kiss the nape of her neck, and then left butterfly kisses on her neck, before leading to the main event: her lips.

They’d had brief kisses on the lips before. They were never  _ the _ kiss, and this seemed like a perfect time as any to have it. Both of them closed their eyes and then, their teeth clashed. Roxy’s teeth pulled at the lower lip of Cessily, while Cessily tried to trace the gums of her girlfriend. It took a moment before they both realized they didn’t know how to kiss each other. 

They both froze for a moment, once they pulled away. They were both washed over with a sense of horror. Cessily didn’t even say goodbye before slinking out the door, leaving Roxy alone in her room. They didn’t react immediately to the kiss, but they both knew that there was something missing, and that neither of them wanted to troubleshoot. Roxy wanted to say something, or apologize but before she could, Cessily was gone. Roxy was left alone in her room, feeling guilty that she had forgotten that she was no longer made of flesh and bone, and was now only diamond. She would have chased after her girlfriend, but knew that Cessily’s embarrassment needed time to settle down. That still had her sadly stare out of the door that was swung open. She sighed heavily before standing up to close it. 

Cessily had run across the dormitory. She slipped past Rachel Grey who had yelled “ _ No running in the halls _ ,” knowing that was a futile attempt to get the students and now adjunct professors to behave. When she got to her room, she threw herself on her bed, panting heavily, and was glad that Noriko and her team were still out on an excursion. 

Cessily had messed up her first kiss, and then she ran away from the scene of the crime, not exactly sure she could ever face Roxy again without dying of shame. 

***

The next morning, Cessily asked Noriko to scope the hallway before she stepped out. She was too ashamed to run into Roxy after last night. The can still the awkwardness of diamond teeth grazing against her mercury lips. Her entire body seized in embarrassment when she thought about it. She took a deep breath when Noriko gave her the thumbs up. Noriko knew better than to ask. 

Breakfast was the most important meal of the day for most people, and that held true for most of the students of the Jean Grey school. However, Cessily knew for a fact that Roxy skipped that meal and instead used that time to work out or run, and would have something on her way back from central park, so for the time being, Cessily could safely make it to the mess hall without any awkward interaction. So Roxy had this luxury of having parents that were still involved in her life, so she had pocket money to avoid the school food. 

Not that the food was horrible by any means, but there were occasions where Cessily looked into the kitchen and saw Glob with one of the chefs, and wondered what proper sanitation procedures existed for a man made out of wax, or if there were any safety procedures since he was so flammable. As he smiled as he handed her plate of scrambled eggs and fruit, she would just have to accept that there were convincing answers to both of those questions. 

At the very least, it had helped her take off her the whole situation with her girlfriend. Still, the whole situation was uncomfortable and she wanted to talk it out with someone so that she could get a better perspective. 

Cessily slammed her tray down next to a few of her old teammates. While the school was less cliquey now, it seemed that most people still stayed with their old friends, and she seemed to always circle back to her original Hellions team. Most of them were dressed in their civves, as it was a weekend, so there wasn’t any surprise that no one wanted to train today. The only person wearing his uniform was Julian, and that was possibly more for stylistic reasons than anything else. They all stopped their conversation to greet her.

“Did you see any interesting mutants yesterday while giving the tour?” Santos asked, trying to wade away from the previous topic of conversation. Cessily had only come in for the latter part of it, but for some reason they were all trying to ride Santos for opinions on something. She wasn’t curious enough to pry. 

Cessily grabbed her fork from the tray, and then stabbed a strawberry with it. “Interesting? Do you mean physically mutated?” 

It wasn’t a politically correct term, but it was better than being called interesting. Santos nodded. 

“A few, why? Are you hoping one of them will join the school?” 

“It would be nice to have new twerps who aren’t psychics around here, it seems like you could get those a dime a dozen.” Santos responded, causing the rest of the group to laugh. 

“Santos is right…it would be nice to have some non-telepaths around here.” Sooraya added. “Do you think any of the children will join the school or is that wishful thinking on both of our parts?” 

“I don’t know, I’m not part of that process. All Roxy and I really do is give tours to people.” Cessily laughed. “Though there were a few who could tell felt more comfortable here than they did anywhere else in their lives.”

Sooraya smiled at the mention of Roxy. “That’s good to hear, how is Roxy by the way? Is she doing well these days?”

Cessily choked on a piece of fruit. She patted her chest with her hand lightly to try and dislodge it. “She’s doing fine. We’ve all had better times but she’s doing fine.” Cessily wanted to bury the subject, but of course that raised suspicion. 

Julian raised an eyebrow at how Cessily dismissive she was over the topic of Roxy. He was going to meddle anyway, so he simply decided to do it now rather than later. 

“Did something happen with Bling? Did you two break up?” Julian asked rather bluntly. That earned him a kick underneath the table from Sooraya, but that wouldn’t shut him up. 

“Nothing happened.” Cessily crossed her arms defensively and frowned. 

“Come on, Cessily if you’re not gonna tell us about it, who are you going to tell?” Julian said, in an attempt to coax it out of her. He pouted, pushing out his lower lip and looking at her like a kicked puppy.

She thought about it for a brief moment, and then looked around at her friends, because of Julian they also wanted to know. Their eyes betrayed them. She huffed and crossed her arms. 

“I couldn’t kiss Roxy, it was all wrong. It felt awful kissing her.” Cessily lamented before staring down at her plate. She didn’t know if it would be appropriate for her to both lament and sneak in some bites of her omelette. She looked up at Julian who was definitely deep in thought about the situation. “Like I kissed her, but something about it was off.” 

“Was it a bad kiss because there was no ‘spark’ or a bad kiss because you’re not a kisser?” Julian asked. 

“What?” 

“When you kiss Roxy, did you feel that metaphorical zap of electricity?” 

Cessily pressed her lips in thought. It was hard to really describe what she felt during the kiss other than awkward. If she thought about it long enough she could remember that feeling of warmth in her chest and on her cheeks. It wasn’t a spark, but it was certainly akin to one. Maybe the term spark was subjective? 

“Do you need that spark?” Cessily asked, glancing over at Julian with a hopeful smile. “I didn’t feel that spark when I was with her. I felt this feeling of happiness taking over me instead.” 

“I guess that counts as a spark.” Julian said. “If you had the spark then I don’t think anything else matters.”

“I haven’t kissed too many people in my life,” Sooraya admitted with a laugh, “but I think you’re just fine if that’s the case.” 

Cessily felt a little bit peaceful now that that was out in the open with the rest of her friends. She wasn’t happy that Julian had coaxed it out of her, but she wasn’t going to entertain him any further, and decided to instead change the subject by shifting it tangentially to who Sooraya had kissed in the past few years. 

Julian was a little miffed that she had changed the subject, but he’d track her down later to get all the details out of her. 

***

After breakfast Julian followed up with Cessily. He knew that she might have felt too embarrassed to talk about everything in detail in front of the rest of the Hellions. 

He caught her in the library, and decided on sitting on the large wooden desk between her and her work. She didn’t seem annoyed that he had caught her there, but she was certainly surprised. Julian wasn’t the type of person who would be found dead in a library. She knew for a fact that he wouldn’t go away unless she gave him what he wanted, and she knew what that would be. Julian wasn’t exactly the type of person who beat around the bush. 

“Are you going to give me unsolicited advice on something I didn’t ask for?” Cessily asked, trying to stay friendly. She was frustrated that he was sitting on top of one of the books that she needed for her research paper but only scrunched up her nose in displeasure. 

“Maybe.” Julian answered, and then smiled. “Do you think you sabotaged the kiss between you and Roxy?” 

“Why would I do that? I like Roxy.” Cessily would have said something much more unpleasant if they weren’t in the library where most people were studying. 

“I know you like her, but she’s the first person you liked since Kevin.” Julian was careful, knowing that this was territory he hadn’t crossed in years. “Maybe like subconsciously or something you freaked out.” 

“I really don’t get the point you’re trying to make here is.” 

“I dunno, I guess what I’m trying to say is that you should try to kiss her again. She’s the first girl you’ve kissed. It was destined to be bad.” 

“But I—“

“Just text her, whatever happened between you two can’t be that bad that she wouldn’t understand it.” Julian said and then began to lift up her phone using his telekinesis. This was to the displeasure of Cessily who knocked it out of the air with the back of her hand. She wasn’t going to let Julian text Roxy whatever he wanted. She knew that he was probably going to either say something offensive or stupid or a combination of them. 

“Don’t touch that phone if you want to keep your limbs, Hellion.” 

Julian smirked and picked the phone up from the floor, and placed it gently beside her. “I respect you too much as an individual to something dumb like text Roxy for you.” 

“There’s a ‘but’ here that you’re not expanding upon.” She reached out to her phone and picked it up gingerly. Despite it being hit pretty hard by her dense metallic hands, it didn’t seem to have gotten hurt too badly, rather just scruffed a little. 

“I think you’re going to set yourself up for failure if you decide that ignoring this until it goes away is what you should do. It’s just a kiss, and I’ve learned from my many failed trials in my relationship is that communication is  _ key _ . Just text her and tell her you wanna talk.” He shrugged. 

Cessily eyed her phone. It was just sitting there waiting, begging her to grab it. She knew that on some level she was overreacting about her kiss. She reached out and began typing away on her screen, writing and deleting messages before she looked up at Julian. She’d be damned to tell him she agreed with him on this one. 

“Would you mind helping me write a message that doesn’t sound too neurotic?”

***

Halfway across campus, Roxy was busy putting together a puzzle with Trevor and Nathaniel. She was very quiet, and not her usually chatty self. While Cessily was lamenting their awful kiss, trying to forget it, Roxy was busy replaying it over and over in her head trying to recognize where she had gone wrong. This was obviously having some effect on her ability to finish the puzzle laid out in front of her. She was picking at the colors but not organizing them or placing them anywhere, which was something unlike her. 

Nathaniel sucked in a deep breath through his teeth before he built up the courage to actually say something about how Roxy was bothered by something that he couldn’t put his hands on, but he realizes that Trevor would probably beat him to the punchline. Trevor was unfortunately great at reading other people’s auras, so he must have had some sort of read on Roxy’s glum mood today as he shifted uncomfortably in his seat while looking back between the puzzle and his diamond skinned friend. His many eyes were trying to not look guilty as they formulated the question in their head. 

“Hey Bling, is there a reason why you’re so….” Trevor searched for the correct term, as to not stumble on his own tongue, “....so blue today? Is there something bothering you?” 

Roxy looked up at her two friends, and put the puzzle piece on her hand down on the table. She let out an awkward laugh, “Is it really that clear that something’s up?” 

“Well, it’s clear to me at the very least, I’m not sure if it’s clear to everyone else, but I can see your aura.” Trevor said, “I can see Nathaniel’s aura too but he’s having a good day so it doesn’t really bother me.”

“If you wanna share what’s upsetting you, you could always do that!” Nathaniel offered. “We’re your friends, and all we want to do is help you get things off your chest.”

Roxy chewed on her bottom lip, unsure of what their reactions would be to something so stupid and egotistical. But Nathaniel and Trevor were the two people she knew that wouldn’t judge her, because they could see the truth no matter what she decided to tell them. “Cess and I tried to kiss each other last night, and I don’t think she liked it much, so she just ran out of the room and we haven’t spoken to each other since. Or texted!” 

Trevor put a comforting hand on Roxy’s shoulder, and then gave it a light squeeze. He didn’t have much to say considering that being covered in eyes for most of his teenagehood meant that he had less experience with relationships than Roxy. 

“I know Cessily is still testing out new territory with me, but I can’t help but feel like I might have pushed her too far, you know? Like what if she hates me now?” 

Nathaniel offered her a slight smile. “Benji and went through that same phase together. You saw it with your own two eyes. I was sort of scared to be in a relationship after how my last one ended and Benji...he was kind enough to take it slowly with me. You are her first relationship in a while too, you do know that, right? I think she’s still adjusting to that.” 

Roxy let out a loud sigh. “I just don’t know if I’m giving her enough space or not, because all I want to do is text her and tell her that if she wants to talk about it, it would be fine with me! I just don’t want to come off as too clingy.” She paused and then pressed the back of her palm to her face. “But I don’t want to come off as too cold either! I don’t want her to think that I’m someone who doesn’t want to let her in or something like that!” 

“Roxy, is this happened last night, you’re not being clingy or distant by not texting her immediately. She probably thinks you’re running errands, or have other things on your mind. You’re overthinking this a little bit.” Nathaniel responded with something comforting, that our Roxy a little bit at ease. “You could text her if you feel you really want to talk about what’s on your mind.” 

Roxy nodded. “You’re right, I should text her.”

She searched her pockets for her phone so that she could text Cessily only to find that there was an unread message for her waiting at the top of the screen, Roxy couldn’t help but smile when she saw it. Maybe she and Cessily were more in tune than she had previously thought. 

***

[ CESSILY 🥰 ]

>> meet me tonight on the porch? 

[ROXANNE WASHINGTON] 

>> Just say when and ill b there

[CESSILY 🥰 ] 

>> Eight! 

[ROXANNE WASHINGTON] 

>> cool, ill see you soon. xx

***

It was almost a full day since the last time Cessily had approached Roxy. Roxy was out on the porch, glistening underneath the first strokes moonlight, as she glanced at her last sent message from Cessily and sighing wistfully while waiting for Cessily. Cessily was uncharacteristically running late. Roxy pulled out her phone to anxiously check if she was in the right location or not, afraid that the reason Cessily wasn’t there was because she had misread the location. 

While Roxy might have not been totally aware of it, Cessily had spent a chunk of her afternoon being given a pep talk by Julian, which frankly helped her out a lot more than she was willing to admit. She also scrambled to make herself look decent in the very little time she had to look decent.she was running across campus, passing Rachel Grey for the second time and being threatened to detention if she was caught again. 

Thankfully, it didn’t take too long for Cessily to appear on the porch, running up the stairs with a bunch of apology carnations. She was panting as she got to the top, but extended the bouquet of flowers out in front of her to Roxy. She tried to catch her breath, but couldn’t help but start laughing when Roxy gave her a quizzical smile about the flowers. 

“I wanted to say sorry about last night. I freaked out. I never kissed anyone before.” Cessily said breathlessly. “I just--”

“Cessily, it’s okay, it was just a kiss.” Roxy stepped forward and took the carnations from Cessily’s hands and pulled her girlfriend into a tight hug. “First kisses are usually bad, like, really bad. You’re forgiven if that’s what you want to hear, but in all realness, it's also my fault.” 

Roxy laughed. “You’re good with me, Cessily, it was alright that you were embarrassed, I kinda was too.” 

Cessily felt a weight just melt off of her. It was an unreal amount of relief that she felt when she was forgiven by Roxy for her freakout. 

If Cessily’s heart could explode, it would have right there. She stepped back and smiled at Roxy, being with Roxy, Cessily realized, was something like a second home. There was a lot of safety in loving Roxy, Cessily realized, as Roxy cupped her face. Roxy was understanding and patient, especially with someone with intimacy issues like herself. There was no need for her to be afraid in their relationship, as Roxy was more than understanding when it came to everything. She had been put through the wringer by her life, but she tried her best to be in good spirits. She tried her best to be both understanding and kind. 

Cessily could get used to the warmth and compassion that Roxy gave her. She leaned into Roxy’s touch with wide lovestruck eyes. 

“I’m sorry. I just haven’t felt this way about someone in years.” She felt like her proclamation of love for Roxy was something she should shout, but it was better kept as a secret between them, “I haven’t liked anyone the way I liked you, ever.” 

Roxy pressed her nose to Cessily’s. She couldn’t help but giggle when proclaimed her love. “It’s the same here, usually pretty girls don’t like me the same way I like them.” 

For the longest time Cessily had convinced herself that unless she was ready to settle down with some freak of nature like Santos or Glob, no one would ever be able to really look past her skin, and even though she told herself that her beauty was more than skin deep, she could never believe it. But with Roxy caressing her face softly, Cessily knew that it was a concern of the past.

“Do you want to try it again? The kissing?” Cessily asked, placing her hand on top of Roxy’s. She smiled with confidence. “We can try to make it perfect this time, if you promise not to use all your teeth.” 

“I promise, as long as you don’t try to shove your tongue down my throat.” Roxy joked. 

They both knew that there was never going to be a perfect first kiss, but they could definitely have a better one. If this kiss was awful, then they’d just try again and again till they knew the taste of each other’s lips like it was their own.

Cessily leaned in pressed her lips against Roxy’s again. Roxy’s lips were cold against hers, but she slowly parted her mouth open, letting Roxy open hers too. There was no spark, but there was a warmth in the inside of their chests as they exchanged their kisses. This kiss, as Roxy found her place in Cessily’s arms, and Cessily wrapped herself around Roxy tightly, was the only thing that was near perfect in either of their lives. 

When they had finally pulled away, both of them exchanged a nervous laugh. They were both satisfied with the outcome of this kiss, considering how disastrous the last one was. Roxy pressed her face against Cessily’s and for the first time they both felt as if they knew everything there was to know. 

“Was this better?” Roxy asked, her arms now wrapped around Cessily’s neck. 

“A  _ whole _ lot better.” Cessily laughed before tightly wrapping her arms around Roxy’s hips and twirling her around. “It was  _ perfect _ .” 


End file.
